Jan. 27.-I can't bear to write it down, but I will. The ink was hardly dry yesterday on the above self-laudation when Amelia came. She had been out of town, and had only just learned what had happened. Of course she was curious to know the whole story.
And I told it to her, every word of it! Oh, Kate Mortimer, how "high-minded" you are! How free from all that is "mean and little"! I could tear my hair if it would do any good?
Amelia defended Charley, and I was thus led on to say every harsh thing of him I could think of. She said he was of so sensitive a nature, had so much sensibility, and such a constitutional aversion to seeing suffering, that for her part she could not blame him.
"It is such a pity you had not had your lungs examined before you wrote that first letter," she went on. "But you are so impulsive! If you had only waited you would be engaged to Charley still!"
"I am thankful I did not wait," I cried, angrily. "Do, Amelia, drop the subject forever. You and I shall never agree upon it. The truth is, you are two-thirds in love with him, and have been, all along."
She colored, and laughed, and actually looked pleased. If anyone had made such an outrageous speech to me I should have been furious.
"I suppose you know," said she, "that old Mr. Underhill has taken such a fancy to him that he has made him his heir; and he is as rich as a Jew."
"Indeed!" I said, dryly.
I wonder if mother knew it when she opposed our engagement so strenuously.
Jan. 31.-I have asked her, and she said she did. Mr. Underhill told her his intentions when he urged her consent to the engagement. Dear mother! How unworldly, how unselfish she is!